The Duchess of York’s compensation claim against Rupert Murdoch over the cash-for-access sting she says destroyed her reputation has doubled to more than £40 million.

In a new lawsuit laying bare the extent of her financial dealings for the first time, Fergie portrays herself as a transatlantic businesswoman, with interests spanning the film industry, high finance, speaking engagements, books and celebrity endorsements.

The ventures include launching a lifestyle brand called House of Ferguson and a series of ‘higher end’ books entitled Madame Pantaloon.

The news follows The Mail on Sunday’s 2016 revelation that the Duchess claimed she been ‘tricked’ by the now-defunct News Of The World and that she was suing for £25 million.

The Duchess of York's compensation claim against Rupert Murdoch over the cash-for-access sting she says has destroyed her reputation has doubled to more than £40m (Pictured: The Duchess on QVC)

But last night one of her new claims – that the 2010 sting ruined her chance to earn a £4.3 million commission from a movie deal – was contested by an Oscar-winning producer.

The sum was part of the staggering £40 million that the Duchess believes she lost in earnings following the story in Mr Murdoch’s newspaper.

She wants Rupert Murdoch to stump up for all this

Personal appearances

Fergie claims that prior to the sting she made £799,000 a year from public speaking and TV appearances, which dropped to £52,000 and then zero.

So from 2010 to 2017 she says she’s lost £4.8m

The ‘Fergie’s farm’ roll out

She claims she had advanced plans for two TV animation shows – Fergie’s Farm, to be followed by Sofi On Safari. Merchandising and DVD sales would have swelled her earnings to a staggering £22m

The ‘Mme Pantaloon’ books

She says plans to launch her Helping Hands children’s book series in America were damaged by the Fake Sheikh scandal. She also had to shelve plans for a series, ‘Madame Pantaloon’, costing her £766k

The health products deal

She says she was in discussions with Windmill Health Products to promote personal care products, including appearances on the QVC shopping channel. The deal was scuppered by the scandal, costing her £8.6m

The big-money commissions

Fergie had agreed to help find investors for a merger of the Jaeger and Aquascutum fashion labels, and was working with an Oscar-winner on new film projects. Loss of commissions cost her £5.8m

The staggering total sum claimed by the Duchess for loss of earnings caused by the News of the World sting £40,584,625

It was published after undercover reporter Mazher Mahmood, known as the Fake Sheikh, secretly filmed his meeting with the Duchess.

She claims Mahmood tricked her into offering to introduce him to her ex-husband Prince Andrew for £500,000.

But in a vigorous counterattack, lawyers for Mr Murdoch’s publishing company accused her of ‘dishonesty’ and attempted fraud, describing her case as ‘defective and embarrassing’.

Her original writ – filed in 2016 – didn’t detail how her finances had been affected by the fall-out.

The new submission says the story ruined a deal the Duchess had struck to finance ‘new projects’ by British film executive Graham King, who produced Martin Scorsese’s The Departed and Hugo.

It says: ‘The Duchess was working to assist... Graham King on raising funds for new projects of $125,000,000 [£90.2 million]. The commission that would have been payable on funds raised was... £4,373,250.’

The ‘introducer agreement’ was not signed because of the story. But last night a source close to Mr King, a friend of the Duchess, expressed surprise at her recollection of a deal and called her claim ‘exaggerated’.

Sources in Fergie’s camp insist it is backed by evidence to be disclosed to the court at a later date.

Better known for spending rather than making money, the Duchess has a chequered financial history. At one point, she owed Coutts bank almost £5 million and, later, her American ‘lifestyle and wellness’ company, Hartmoor, collapsed with debts of more than £600,000.

In April 2010, a month before the News Of The World story, the Duchess reportedly faced financial ruin after being taken to the High Court by a leading legal firm for debts of more than £200,000.

But far from penury, the writ suggests that at this juncture she had acquired a Midas touch, having lined up a series of multi-million-pound contracts.

In addition to the film deal, she says she had agreed to find investors for a private equity firm ‘working to accomplish the merger of the Jaeger and Aquascutum fashion brands’. Her commission would have been between £1 million and £1.5 million.

Undercover reporter Mazher Mahmood, known as the Fake Sheikh, secretly filmed his meeting with the Duchess where she offered to introduce him to ex-husband Prince Andrew for £500k

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Fergie says a plan to launch lifestyle products bearing the hallmark ‘House of Ferguson’ was also wrecked. And the papers reveal she was working on an animation project, Sofi On Safari, which, with another cartoon, Fergie’s Farm, would have given the Duchess £22 million in earnings between 2010 and the present day.

But she says her ‘international humiliation’ scared off investors and she did not earn a penny.

Around the time of the sting, she launched her pre-school Helping Hands book series in the US, but according to the writ the adverse publicity meant she only sold 50,000 copies, far fewer than anticipated.

The court papers reveal another planned book series– a ‘higher end publication’ entitled Madame Pantaloon – was also shelved.

In all, the scuppered book deals cost her, she says, £766,375 in lost royalty earnings over two years.

Fergie alleges Mahmood 'entrapped' her

Relaxing in a Mayfair apartment, the Duchess believed she was in the company of a wealthy businessman. Instead she was sitting with undercover reporter Mazher Mahmood, who Fergie claims tricked her into saying she could arrange access to her ex-husbandfor £500,000

Fergie says her other losses include £8,645,000 she would have earned as a celebrity endorser of vitamins, dietary supplements and personal care products for US company Windmill Health Products.

Windmill pulled out of a deal after the Fake Sheikh story before any agreement was signed.

The amount lost from the abandoned House of Ferguson project will be disclosed at a later date, but it is expected to see her total claim rise to around £45 million, twice her original estimate.

In 2009, she was paid £20,000 by ITV for the documentary The Duchess On The Estate, when she spent ten days on a Manchester housing estate.

The Duchess lives rent-free at Royal Lodge, a 30-bedroom mansion in Windsor Great Park, as a guest of the Duke of York.

In the 2010 sting she was also recorded accepting £27,600 ‘to show commitment’ to a proposed investment. She told the reporter: ‘I can open any door you want.’

But the writ claims Mahmood –who was jailed in 2016 for tampering with evidence in the collapsed drugs trial of pop star Tulisa Contostavlos – invaded the Duchess’s privacy and ‘used deceit’ to induce her to make ‘unguarded statements to her detriment’.

She says that when the News Of The World ran the story, it took her comments out of context, causing ‘serious embarrassment, humiliation, distress and reputational damage’ and huge financial losses.

News Group Newspapers, which published the now defunct tabloid, insists the story, headlined ‘Fergie “Sells” Andy for £500k’, was both true and in the public interest.

A 21-page defence document alleges the Duchess was prepared to ‘enter into a corrupt arrangement’ to secure access to Andrew.

It says she suggested to Mahmood that ‘commercial favours could be bought from a member of the Royal Family’ and that her ex-husband’s trade envoy role could be exploited ‘provided the price was right and the money went to her’.

Sarah Ferguson married Andrew in 1986. But the couple separated in 1992, two months after photos showed her having her toes sucked by financial adviser John Bryan.

After the couple divorced in 1996, she received £2 million in a settlement and went on to draw £2 million a year as a Weight Watchers ambassador from 1996 to 2007.

The writ claims Mahmood – who was jailed in 2016 for tampering with evidence in the collapsed drugs trial of pop star Tulisa Contostavlos – invaded the Duchess’s privacy and ‘used deceit’ to induce her to make ‘unguarded statements to her detriment’

After that, she no longer enjoyed a guaranteed income but made money from books, the US lecture circuit and endorsements.

After the Fake Sheikh story was published, the Duchess apologised for a ‘serious lapse of judgment’ and said her financial situation was ‘under stress’.

In a TV interview with Oprah Winfrey, she claimed she had been drinking and was ‘in the gutter at that moment’. Buckingham Palace said at the time that Andrew categorically denied any knowledge of meetings between Mahmood and his ex-wife.

Mahmood is named as a defendant in the writ along with News Group Newspapers, former News Of The World editor Colin Myler and ex-News International legal affairs manager Tom Crone.

She said she ‘was in the gutter at that moment’

The defence document adds: ‘The Duchess represented to a previously unknown person that commercial favours and inside information could be bought from a member of the Royal Family, and the role of a UK ambassador for trade could be turned to account for private profit, provided the price was right and the money went to her and not the Duke of York.’

The newspaper also believed that after taking a fee for the introduction, the Duchess would have a powerful incentive to obtain secrets from Andrew to sell for a profit.

And it contends she did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy, as she claims, because the story concerned her business dealings not her private life.

Her statements about securing access were, it says, ‘untrue and, as the Duchess knew, dishonest’.

She repeatedly told Mahmood she was in a desperate financial situation, about to go bankrupt, and was financially inept, the defence says.